Necessary Sacrifice
by Colonel Frosting
Summary: As Max discovers her power to manipulate time and tries to use it for good, someone decides to give her a practical lesson in the dangers of tampering with anything from small decisions to making actions which save lives directly. Should saving people in the short-term win out over good longer-term change? Should she use her power to intervene at all?
1. A New Variable

Max was physically trembling. Not just her hands and arms, but just about the whole rest of her body too. Her heart was racing with a pulse strong enough that it was threatening to throw her off-balance and make her fall over. Something which would've been unfortunate given how unsteady she was with her newfound powers - her power which had somewhat gotten her into this current circumstance. A dream about a storm, then seeing that murder play out in front of her after class before she got shot right back in time - and rode things out to this very moment. She was pretty convinced that this wasn't any kind of dream or hallucination, but even if it was she'd be damned if she wasn't going to go through the motions and try to do the right thing - to save this girl from the almighty preppy Nathan Prescott.

She had to hit the fire alarm, to distract Nathan and maybe get some kind of help or report him. She found the hammer which dropped on the ground, and was about to smash in the glass and pull the alarm, but she heard a deafening bang first. She froze in place, a shiver causing her body to solidify as she remained still for a few moments - having heard the other girl's body fall to the ground and Nathan's subsequent freakout. While only hearing it this time, the audio cues were all she needed for the full visual she got before to play over in her head.

She shook herself free after a moment, however, breaking her limbs out of their shocked and fearful state to move up her hand and try t0 revert time once more. Thankfully for her the action was rather natural and hard to forget even though this was only her third time or so doing it intentionally. It was like she'd found a new muscle, one which when contracted caused this reversal of time. Though it was certainly rather draining for her if she went a bit too far too fast with it, and the air became uncomfortably still whenever she initiated the reversal. Though she figured those caveats a fair enough compromise for voluntary time travel.

Allowing time to flow forward around her once again, she took a shallow breath as she heard the pair of voices speaking once again, she had more time. Really she had infinite time if she thought about it... Though not one to push the limits of what she didn't yet understand, she was quick to move to enact her plan once more - already facing the fire alarm with the small hammer in-hand, ready to smash it. She could get it this time!

Though as she moved to make the small flick in her wrist to shatter the glass and reveal that lever so that she could save the day and whoever this drug-dealing girl was, she felt a bit off. Silence enveloped the room out of nowhere - she heard no words being spoken anymore, not even the gentle breeze through the window, or the background hum that came from a building wired with electricity and air conditioning filled with people. All went uncomfortably quiet, and the air became similarly still.

Max froze with the environment around her, practically out of instinct. She was already quite scared and anxious about the situation she was in, and now what was happening? She knew she wasn't the cause. After a few long seconds, however, the cause of the altered and uneasy atmosphere made itself known.

The girl found herself quickly grappled from behind - a mildly hairy arm making it's way around her neck while another wrapped around her midsection and managed to pull down and keep both of her arms at her sides.

Her eyes went wide, and she was quick to wriggle and struggle against whoever had grabbed her. It wasn't Nathan clearly, there's no way he took down that girl and so quickly made his way over here. Not to mention his arms were as hairless as his babyface, at least as far as Max recalled. Regardless, the poor girl wasn't exactly strong in such an overpowering position as this. Her anxiety was also peaking by this stage, causing her body to shake and shiver involuntarily in denial of her conscious commands for it to do otherwise. She was too afraid and panicked to even speak, merely giving soft grunts of struggle through gritted teeth as she soon felt her backside press against what must've been her captor's body. Whoever he was, he was evidently a bit taller than her, no surprises there...

"Shh," she soon heard - the man's voice breaking that unnatural silence which had up to this point only been interrupted by Max's own sounds of struggle.

That in itself filled her somehow with more fear and anxiety, and she was looking around frantically as much as she could, though her head was more or less locked in place with that arm around her neck. He wasn't depriving her of air though, at least not by much.

"Quit it, you're not getting out," they soon continued in a tone barely louder than a whisper, and one of only mild annoyance.

It finally occurred to Max that she could speak too, as she had air and an uncovered mouth. Instead of asking for help, though, she asked the more obvious, "W-Who are you?" Followed by her voicing of perhaps the more pressing mystery, "How did... You get in here?"

Indeed, the current even split of males to females in the girl's bathroom was a bit unsettling.

"Michael Conrad, class of seventy-eight," He said plainly, "I'll tell you more if you promise to not run away or do anything stupid."

Well, that provided more questions than answers. Max stopped struggling entirely for a moment while her brain tried to process all that was going on. She hadn't cracked yet fortunately, which was more of a feat than one may expect. She'd had a pretty loaded day so far. Heck, a pretty loaded hour or so.

"Seventy-eight? A-As in nineteen seventy-eight?" She was quick to inquire.

The lad rolled his eyes, "Do you promise, or not?" He retorted, his grip on her remaining solid and tightening ever so slightly as she shifted to stop her struggling entirely in her confusion.

"Wha-" She blinked, "Y-Yeah, sure," she replied with little confidence. Her brain had been racing before, but with this new wildcard it was going even faster. Similarly to her heart, though with the threat of that horrific scene playing out in this restroom seemingly on hold for the moment, she was doing rather well at ignoring that little detail.

As soon as the words left her lips, his grip completely loosened - arms sliding off of her and allowing her to quickly step forward and turn to face him with wide eyes. She moved one of her arms up, trying to pull a fast one and revert time once again to maybe see where he came from. Though as she attempted to reverse time, she found that while that rogue butterfly near the window seemed to move in reverse, the figure before her did not. In fact, he just stood there with crossed arms staring her down.

He was almost a full head taller than her, with poofy brown hair, an overall average build which was a bit on the lanky side. His attire would scream hipster if the rest of his general aesthetic didn't also fit that category. She looked him up and down, trying to take in the strange blend of styling. He had a bit of everything going on. A scarf with faded red and yellow stripes adorning it draped around his shoulders, a white track jacket tied by the sleeves around his waist which matched his pants, while he seemed to be wearing some Black Sabbath t-shirt under a button-up collared shirt with some gaudy diamond-stitched pattern. None of it really seemed to match or make sense to Max, who's brief analysis of his appearance ended with the calculator watch adorning his left wrist.

"Yes, as-in nineteen seventy-eight," he answered while she gawked after her attempt to reverse time didn't work. A move she would've tried while she was restrained if it didn't require her to make a movement with her arm. "As for how I got in here," he soon continued, "I walked through the door. A pretty easy thing to do unnoticed when it all happens in fractions of a second."

"Oh... Kay..." She tried to compose herself, the room still silent and unmoving save for herself and Michael. Deciding to take a step back, she only made it one pace before her butt hit that janitor cart. So much for widening the gap between them.

"Weird day, huh?" He asked simply, straight-faced. He certainly didn't look like he was from the class of seventy-eight. At least as far as age was concerned, wardrobe was a completely different story. He looked no older than most of the seniors she attended school with. 'Maybe he's just messing with me,' she thought for a moment before her brain shot that theory to bits. She'd never seen him here before, and first encountering him in this place at this time very quickly ruled out the idea that he was just a bit of a weirdo.

"You could say that," she mumbled, gaze shifting to look at one of the sink mirrors to his back to try and get a glimpse at Nathan and that girl he was holding up. Though the angle was wrong, she couldn't get a picture, and her eyes then flicked back to Michael's eyes. "Are you here because I can-" She cut herself off. It was an odd thing to think about, let alone to say out loud, "d-do that time travel thing?"

He shrugged, "Eh, maybe a little, I'm moreso interested in the murder that's about to happen," He said as he leaned back a bit and glanced over to the pair locked in a rather deadly pose across the room, before he made eye-contact with Maxine once more. "Yeah, of course I'm here for you. You just got this 'power' kickstarted an hour or so ago, right?"

Max nodded, though was cut off before she could speak. Not like her brain was even caught up enough that she could speak properly.

"Then you've only just scratched the surface of what you'll be able to do when you master this thing. You can only revert time by a little bit, right?"

She gave another quiet, slightly hesitant nod. She didn't bother to ask the next obvious question, she could guess the answer for herself.

He gave a nod of his own in assurance, "I don't want to rail you with information you'll forget or fail to comprehend, so I'll try and put this slow and simple-" He then even slowed his rate of speaking to allow his words to sink in easier, "There's no real reason I can find why this happens to some people, but it seems to happen specifically at Blackwell. And even with your basic grasp on things now, your ability will only grow in depth, and right now the door has opened for you to do many great and terrible things. With me so far?"

Max couldn't bring herself to do much more than give a slow nod in reply.

"The ability to travel in time, to go back and forth at will, change your past decisions in potentially profound ways, that's in itself a great power. You're familiar with the butterfly effect and chaos theory I'm sure?" He stated, pausing for her acknowledgement to ensure that all - or at least most - of what he was saying was indeed sinking in.

"Uh-huh," she replied simply preceding yet another nod before elaborating, "The idea that a small change in starting point or one variable can lead to a vastly different outcome later on."

It was his turn then to nod in reply before continuing, "Exactly. This is something you should always keep in mind now that you have this 'ability' of yours now, and is the most basic concept you should remember whenever using your power on anything small or large. Now-" He then turned his head to look left once again, "deciding to maybe say something different, or maybe say nothing at all in a conversation versus the first time is one thing. But where we really get to the juicy problems is matters of life and death."

His gaze returned to her again, hers shifting left and right then back on him, "Y-Yeah?" She shakily replied, suddenly being reminded of the situation unfolding on the other half of the bathroom which was now causing her a deal of distress once again. At least she had a tiny break from it.

"Now what exactly were you planning on doing?" He inquired, glancing down at the small red hammer on the floor, then to the fire alarm glass that it was meant to break.

"I was..." She began, her own gaze following where his went - to the hammer on the floor, then around to the fire alarm behind her. "Going to hit the fire alarm," she said simply with a hint of hesitation in her voice. As if doing so was already a wrong choice.

"And what motivates you to make that decision over any others? You could hide out here, heck you can probably rewind time just enough to not even be in this room and not be at all accountable for hesitating."

Her brow furrowed in response, "And what, let her get shot by Nathan Prescott of all people over some drugs or whatever? No way!" She exclaimed, raising her voice finally.

This caused one of Michael's eyebrows to rise as his crossed arms held themselves up in front of himself, "Do you even know this girl?" He asked, glancing to the side again to try and get a look at her across the room briefly as his arms moved to rest at his sides. "Looks like some white trash to me, and if she's dealing drugs that's not a good sign either."

"So what?" The brown-haired girl was quick to retort, "Why shouldn't I save her from Nathan? It's not like she instigated this... At least, not very overtly..." She said, small clouds of doubt entering her mind. She didn't recognize the girl really, but there was something about her that was vaguely familiar.

"You didn't answer my question," He said back. "You almost seem to want to save her to spite this Prescott kid more than anything else. Though I guess I'd want to spite a douche who snuck into the girl's bathroom with a gun too," He pondered.

"Yeah, see I-" She tried to reinforce her position, but she was quickly cut off by the unarmed male.

"But you're missing my point. Butterfly effect, chaos theory, time travel - think about the big picture here. Let's say this punk shoots this girl, what do we end up with?" He asked in a seemingly rhetorical manner which Max didn't reply to. "We end up with an unsuppressed gunshot in the girl's bathroom during school hours, and a victim - who by the way may very well not die, modern healthcare is a wondrous thing you know - both of which are clear-cut easy grounds for this kid to get arrested and then some."

Max rolled her eyes and huffed, "Yeah right, that's Nathan Prescott - his family practically owns Blackwell. He'd probably get off with little more than a smack on the wrist."

Michael's brow furrowed at that, "You're downplaying the gravity of the situation," he said seemingly about to say more before stopping himself, "you know what? Let's see what happens."

Max's eyes went wide as the other man approached her, and stood beside her. In doing so, the air felt distilled - the butterfly was on the move once more out the window, the silence Max had gotten used to over the last few minutes of talking being overridden by the deafening ambiance of the world around her followed by the sounds of struggle and dialogue from the blue-haired girl and Nathan.

Instinctively, the brown-haired girl reached out her hand to try and revert time - only for Michael to quickly move to restrain her in a similar fashion to when he first encountered her - though this time his other arm was over her mouth so she couldn't so much as talk. A loud bang, and her ears were ringing once again as she struggled against this more experienced time traveler's embrace. Her heart lept in her chest, the anxiety and stress of the situation all coming down on her at once, but this experience was far from over.


	2. Alternate Consequences

A gun fired, a body on the floor, the firearm in question tossed aside. Max had seen and heard this outcome four times now, and it was four too many. She leaned more towards being introverted and was as normal as any person could really be. Being a standard teenage girl, the sound of that overly loud, echoing firearm followed by deafening silence in that enclosed bathroom on its own shook her to the bone and had her in a stunned silence of her own.

Oh yeah, the lifeless corpse also hitting the floor following that didn't help matters either. Nor the fact that she was more or less being held against her will and forced to be helpless and watch this unfold. Her eyes and Michael's were placed to look right around the corner of that last stall in the row, allowing the pair to remain mostly hidden as that blue-haired girl on the floor began to produce a gradually expanding pool of blood. She was still, and seemingly not even breathing. The well-placed shot hit her chest quite near her heart by the looks of things, if not directly. Though even the most novice of shooters would have a hard time missing with the barrel of the gun less than an inch from its target.

The aforementioned shooter was seemingly losing his mind at this stage, mumbling aloud in slurred speech as his immediate thoughts spilled out of his mouth with no filter or structure. He paced left and snapped right then back again rapidly, hands fidgeting with themselves as he looked to the corpse before himself then away again. Max and Michael could've been standing out in the open and he probably wouldn't have noticed.

"Pretty pathetic sight if you ask me, should've come up with a backup plan..." Michael whispered into Max's ear, his words and the proximity of his mouth to her causing the girl to shudder and try her best to move away from him slightly, but to no avail.

Moments later, the bathroom door was suddenly and violently kicked open - causing Max to twitch. Entering the room promptly was everyone's favorite annoyance - Security Officer Madsen, his own gun drawn. A quick scan of the room caused him wide eyes as he found the recently shot girl on the floor, followed by the presence of a male in the girl's bathroom. The fact that this male was Nathan Prescott didn't help things, and as the clearly guilty boy didn't do much more than flinch and stand there when the officer arrived, that allowed Madsen to very quickly and easily put the pieces together.

"You!" The veteran growled, grabbing Nathan by one shoulder and spinning him so that his back was facing the officer - promptly slamming his face down on the counter afterwards. Roughly, the Security Officer grabbed both of Nathan's hands and put them behind his back before restraining them with some zip-cuffs. Maybe not as elegant as standard metal handcuffs, but they worked just the same.

Directly following this, the ex-soldier was then on his walkie-talkie, "Principal Wells, I'm issuing a lockdown of the school right now, we have a shooter on-premises," He stated as he glanced over with a tinge of visible pain towards the lifeless body still laying on the floor. Following a one-syllable acknowledgement from the principal, the security officer was then quick to call the relevant local authorities.

During which time, the intercoms of the school soon came to life with the voice of Wells. "All students and staff, remain on school property - we are in a state of lockdown. This is not a drill. Repeat, no-one is to leave the campus at this time. Anyone in violation of this lockdown will receive summary discipline afterward." Perhaps not the most thorough of announcements, but as long as it did what it was supposed to...

Hearing the distant sound of police sirens getting nearer, Michael tensed slightly. "We need to get out of here," was the only warning Max got as time moved to stand still once again and she was almost lifted off the ground and carried out of the bathroom by Michael - her back pressed to his chest in the process. The girl didn't so much as wriggle as a state of shock began to set in on her, her head turning to take in the full sight of that blue-haired girl on the floor. There was a guilt welling further up inside of her now, and the feeling that she somehow knew this girl. It was right on the tip of her tongue, but she didn't quite get it.

She remained in her own stunned silence as they exited that bathroom and she was placed back down on her own feet and time was seemingly moving forward once again. She was also given relative freedom, as Michael had moved to her side and wrapped an arm around her shoulders to keep her moving forward. Max didn't have any objections as she was corralled onward, even if the pair of them seemed to get looks from the other students on their way down the halls and out the front door. It was near the end of the day anyway, so regardless of the lockdown people were about to be heading towards their dorms or else wait in general to head home. Staff were quite prevalent to make sure nobody left school grounds, and were pointing students towards their dorms or else the main office to wait to go home.

This had the effect of pushing students to move more quickly and orderly than normal in whichever direction they were supposed to be going. Something which irritated the students, but was overall helpful for organization. Especially as multiple police vehicles pulled up to the school in addition to an ambulance - the first responders marching quickly across the school yard to rush into the school building itself, which was at this stage mostly empty.

Michael looked back over his shoulder at the officers marching off inside to secure the premises and, presumably, apprehend the obvious suspect. He looked ahead and exhaled in relief as he and Max passed the threshold into the dormitory yard. At the same time, Max somewhat snapped out of her state of relative shock and introspective conversation with herself to look around frantically for a moment - trying to pull away fruitlessly from Michael as they walked along.

"Where.. What-" She began, only to be cut off by a chastising "Good, you're back, now maybe you can help direct me to where your dorm is," from the man who was walking in step beside her.

She gritted her teeth in annoyance, and whispered up at him, "They're separated by gender, idiot, they'll never let you in." There was a clear hint of poison in her voice, she was unhappy with this situation and he was going to know it.

He rolled his eyes, "Ohh, but can't I just say I identify as female and then they'll let me in?" He replied. In glancing to her, he was met with a sideways expression, seemingly mixed with disgust and mild confusion. "Nevermind," was all he quipped back with. "I'll find my own way in and meet you at your room."

In the blink of an eye, Max had been freed - her eyes widening for a moment as empty air surrounded her. She wrapped her arms around herself in a hug as she got brief respite from Michael, a man who had already made quite the impression on her in the twenty minutes or so they'd known each other. She did her best to continue on into the dorm, however, only to be stopped not a few steps past the entry doors by an all-too-familiar voice.

"There's the retro-zone hipster now!" Came the searing voice of the one and only Victoria Chase, and it was one that you couldn't just ignore. At least, Max couldn't.

Thus she instantly fell prey, and stopped walking, only to turn to face Victoria and her little posse, "What is it, Victoria?" She asked simply. A move that was perhaps a mistake.

"I'm glad you asked!" She replied cheerfully - and a cheerful Victoria was always a bad sign, "Don't act like everyone didn't see that guy walking with you just now. Looks like the hipster loser finally found herself a boyfriend!~" She chided.

Max's eyes went wide and her face flushed a dark red, "H-Hey-! It's not- He's-!" She stumbled over her words, though she couldn't even form a proper rebuttal in her head before Victoria fired her next volley.

"And how befitting of Claufield to be paired up with some nerd dressed like -that-! His clothes looked like a genre-bash of the last five decades thrown randomly together, I don't even know how he got into the school with fashion sense that bad," She continued, quickly being backed-up by one of her cronies.

"Maybe that's why we've never seen him before, it took the school this long to decide to let him in!" Then following this came a brief chorus of snickers before the trio continued down the hallway and passed Max.

"I don't even need to sabotage your reputation, the world is doing it for me," Victoria left off as the group soon vanished down the semi-busy hallway likely into Victoria's dorm room.

Max's heart was racing in a fit of embarrassment, frustration and genuine anger - her face even still red as she marched down the hallway to her own room, opening the door before slamming it shut behind herself. Pressing her back to the door, she soon slid down it until her butt met the floor - her knees bet and feet still planted on the floor right in front of her.

Her face rested in her hands for a moment, until she heard the twanging of her acoustic guitar. It was playing a song she didn't recognize, but even given that she could tell it was a less-than-stellar rendition. Uncovering her face, she looked to her desk, where in the chair Michael was sat - he was indeed the source of the bad playing, and soon enough he paused and looked over to her from across the room.

He just silently waved, waiting a moment before speaking. "Heyy, you took your sweet time. Why's your face red? You okay?" Another poor choice of words.

"Am I okay?" She asked back, before slowly standing upright, "Am -I-, okay?" She closed the gap between them, though Michael stayed put. "No, I'm not fucking okay!" She said in a barely contained whisper, "Because of you, I saw a girl get shot and probably die in the bathroom, and I couldn't stop it, and now thanks to you Victoria's got even more dirt to kick up at me!"

His brow furrowed, and he set the guitar aside - leaning it against the girl's desk before he stood up, "Did I pull the trigger?" He asked flatly.

Max paused, "No, but-"

"Then why are you acting like I killed that girl and made you watch?" He continued.

The girl tried to find her resolve, "Because you directly prevented me from saving her!"

Michael gave a long nod, "Oooh, I see. I stopped you from having your hero moment."

"Hero mo-... No! That's not what I-"

"Look, you need to stop thinking linearly," He cut her off once more. "You have the power to control time - at least somewhat. You need to stop thinking like time only goes forward. The past isn't just the past to you anymore, you've got to understand and embrace that fact if you want to build on this power and do anything with it beyond correcting short-term mistakes."

She merely blinked at his lecturing, standing in silence once more as she tried to let the information sink in. It was at this point that Michael moved to look around her slightly messy room, Max taking this moment to plop down on her bed.

"This is, way too much..." she said to no-one in particular, looking at the floor.

However, her moment of thought and contemplation was soon shattered as there was a knock on the door - Michael and Max looking to it in sync.

A voice soon followed, "Police, open up, we just have a couple questions."


End file.
